Can a Christian Doubt Heaven?

by Michael Shackleton · Published June 24, 2025 · Updated June 24, 2025

Ceiling frescoes in Wieskirche (Photo: Gunther Simmermacher)

Question: Many Christians seem to take a light-hearted approach to the existence of heaven. I meet some people who shrug and say things like, “if there really is anything out there when we die…” Does this not suggest that their faith is shallow?

Answer: Our Christian faith starts with our belief in the resurrection: Jesus Christ died, was buried and yet, astonishingly, came back to full life. St Paul wrote: “If Christ has not been raised then our preaching is useless and our faith is useless” (1 Corinthians 15:14).

The Gospels describe how the risen Saviour interacted with his disciples, so we have some idea of how a resurrected man behaves. We don’t understand how he passed through closed doors to call on his disciples (John 20:19), but we believe it. He was referring to us when he told Thomas: “Happy are those who have not seen and yet believe” (John 20:29).

We possess the virtue of faith as a supernatural habit by which we firmly believe those things to be true which God has revealed to us. It’s supernatural because our free acceptance of these things is supported by the grace of God who cannot deceive nor be deceived. Our faith is firmly based.

Yet there are many aspects of our faith that can be unclear despite our belief in them. We believe in the existence of heaven but we cannot imagine what sort of experience it would be. St Paul understood this when he wrote that no eye has seen and no ear has heard, things beyond the mind of man, that God has prepared for those who love him (1 Corinthians 2:9).

Perhaps it is this inexplicable expectation of what God has prepared for us which can make us shrug and perhaps act with the appearance of doubt. Someone with strong faith may be ignorant of what God has prepared for us in heaven, but this ignorance is neither doubt nor a sign of a shallow faith. We should remember this when we recite the Creed, which we should do often and with the intention of reaffirming our deep beliefs.

Answered by advisory editor Michael Shackleton in the April 2025 issue of The Southern Cross